6th ID intensifies campaign vs BIFF

MAGUINDANAO --- The military is preparing for retaliations by the outlawed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters following Wednesday’s death of five members in a clash with soldiers in Datu Paglas town.

The BIFF has a reputation for bombing non-military targets, business establishments and public conveyances to avenge losses in clashes with pursuing state security forces.

“We will not lower our guard. Our efforts to nip this group from the bud will continue until normalcy is restored in areas where they operate,” Major Gen. Juvymax Uy, commander of the Army’s 6^th Infantry Division, said Thursday.

The five BIFF gunmen, initially identified only as Anding, Said, Bitol, Musib and Habib, were killed in an encounter with soldiers of the Army's 601st Infantry Brigade in the outskirts of Datu Paglas on Wednesday morning.

Four of them were confirmed dead based on “body counts” while the fifth, Habib, who was wounded in the gunfight and was carried by companions as they fled, succumbed later, according to witnesses, two of them barrio school teachers.

Habib was from North Cotabato, according to sources in the province,

They were among about a hundred BIFF gunmen who stormed the town proper of Datu Paglas town in Maguindanao on Saturday morning, provoking an hour-long gunfight with responding military units.

Brig. Gen. Roy Galido, commander of the 601st Infantry Brigade, said soldiers were to check on the reported presence of armed men Wednesday in the outskirts of Datu Paglas when they were attacked, sparking a gunfight that resulted in the death of the five BIFF bandits

The encounter was preceded by Tuesday's meeting between President Rodrigo Duterte and senior officials of the Bangsamoro region and local executives from Maguindanao in the Army's Camp Siongco in Datu Odin Sinsuat town in Maguindanao.

President Duterte then warned that the government would flex its full military might against the BIFF if Bangsamoro officials and local government units in the province cannot help neutralize its forces in Maguindanao.

The chief minister of BARMM, Ahod Ebrahim, is chairman of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

The MILF and Malacañang are bound by agreements to cooperate in addressing security issues in the Bangsamoro region. 

President Duterte, during his visit to this province on Tuesday, said the BIFF remains the biggest hindrance to peace in the BARMM area.

“The monkeywrench of the whole situation now is the BIFF... They continue to burn, ambush, detonate bombs, talagang full-blown terrorism,” Duterte said.

He appealed to BARMM officials to help control the BIFF or he would be forced to order an all-out offensive against the group.

Duterte said he does not want the situation to go out of control, but noted that the lives of soldiers and policemen are at stake.

“It’s life that is involved here.Kung hindi ko mapigilan and there will be an all-out offensive, iyan na ang problema. And if I give the order, I will no longer withdraw it,” he said.

“Nagmamakaawa ako sa inyo tulungan ninyo ako because otherwise.if I give the order for an all-out offensive, it will be bloody and it will be sad,” Duterte said.

Uy, also commander of the anti-terror Joint Task Force Central, said their 601^st and 602^nd Infantry Brigades and the Brigade Combat Team 1 --- that has three battalions --- that just arrived in Maguindanao from Camp Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija, will escalate the hunt for BIFF forces in the province and in nearby areas.

“We shall hunt for them in every nook and cranny of areas within our AOR (area of responsibility). Even so, we will welcome those who would want to surrender, return to the fold of law and get reintegrated into mainstream society,” Uy said.